Citations

GPIAtlantic gave a presentation to the Law Amendments Committee on Bill No. 146, An Act Respecting Environmental Goals and Sustainable Prosperity on Wednesday, April 4, 2007. We are happy to report that the committee accepted one of our key recommendations, changing the phrases "economic growth" to "economic development" throughout the bill.

Although it may seem small, this is actually a very significant step forward. As John Ralston Saulspoke about at the Rethinking Development conference, changing the language is the first step to a paradigm shift in the way our society functions. Most importantly, this sets a precedent - every time the economic growth language creeps into economic strategies and other legislation we can remind legislators that - in their wisdom - they had previously removed this language. This is very exciting for GPI Atlantic, and a sign that our message is having an effect in government.

“We are indebted to organizations such as GPI Atlantic who have
been actively engaged in researching and developing the
environmental indicators upon which we have relied throughout
this report. One of the greatest challenges we faced was the
paucity of regularly updated indicators (both international and
national) for environmental-economic well-being. We believe more
measures for the environmental economy are needed.”